


brand new (just the same)

by florulentae



Category: NCT (Band)
Genre: Alternate Universe - College/University, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Miscommunication, Pining
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-25
Updated: 2019-07-25
Packaged: 2020-06-25 12:20:29
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,048
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19745656
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/florulentae/pseuds/florulentae
Summary: Taeyong and Johnny were friends, at first. They still are, if anyone asks Johnny. But once, they were something else. Not anything fully shaped or solid. Just something that was way past friendship and not quite yet commitment.They were—are—friends, and they share basically the same friend group. It’s more than normal, albeit a little awkward at times, to be around each other. Honestly, the awkwardness is nothing compared to how bad it was when he first got back from Chicago. Taeyong wouldn’t even look at him in the eye after ignoring his texts for the better part of a month.





	brand new (just the same)

**Author's Note:**

> Prompt fill for #76. I completely botched their ages to fit my own narrative, sorry about that!
> 
> Title is from [this](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O6DEuYshML0) beautiful song by St Vincent. Huge thanks to the friends that have encouraged me through different fandoms for letting me pester you two into joining enrara; another big thank you to the angel I met thanks to this fest, for the constant love and support.
> 
> To the person that prompted this, I hope this fits in with what you had pictured for this story ♡

This is how it starts: Johnny walks briskly into the library and desperately tries to look casual as he roams around the first floor, looking for Jaehyun with little success. The big idiot is probably trying to cram for a test he forgot about until 9pm.

It’s not until Johnny moves up to the second floor—ignoring the weird look he gets from one of the students after he accidentally trips on their laptop charger cable—that he spots a familiar head of hair belonging to a hunched figure sitting in a corner. Johnny discretely fist pumps before advancing towards the unaware man.

“My _man_ , Jaehyun!” Johnny exclaims in English after walking up to him. Jaehyun startles at the unexpected noise way too close to his ear. The business major turns around, left hand over his racing heart and glares daggers at Johnny. He mumbles a half-hearted apology and pulls out the chair next to Jaehyun’s. “Best friend, _bro_ for life—” he adds in a softer voice. He’s quickly cut off by Jaehyun’s finger pressing against his lips.

“What… are you doing here?” Jaehyun asks, keeping his voice down to a much tamer level than Johnny’s.

“I was just, you know, walking around,” Johnny replies, shrugging as casually as he can manage.

“At eleven. On a Wednesday,” Jaehyun deadpans. Johnny leans back in his chair.

“ _Yeah_ ,” Johnny states. He doesn’t elaborate any further because while he knows his excuse is weak, he isn’t about to let Jaehyun poke and prod at him until he gets Johnny to spill before Johnny even manages to get the information he wants from the younger man.

“Okay,” Jaehyun replies, easily, but he’s staring at Johnny expectantly like he’s waiting for him to say that he broke their electric kettle again—he _didn’t break it_ in the first place—or that he had managed to start a small fire in their shared room.

“I brought you a _snack_!” Johnny says defensively, voice a little high pitched and way outside of the parameters allowed within the library as he presents Jaehyun with an opened and mostly untouched bag of salted peanuts.

“Johnny, we are in the middle of the _library_ ,” Jaehyun hisses under his breath, pointing at Johnny with his pen. He ignores the fact that they are currently sat in a corner of the second floor where literally no one ever sits, much less at this time of night. “I have a test tomorrow, what do you _want_?” he adds. Johnny feels a little bit threatened but not enough to stop his perfect plan.

It’s hard to take Jaehyun seriously when even after his harsh words he still reaches over, grabs a handful of peanuts, and munches on them—loudly, because he’s a heathen who makes the worst sort of noises when he’s eating and doesn’t particularly give a shit about whether or not other people _hear_ him.

And anyway, Johnny’s built up an immunity at this point. Sleep deprived Jaehyun was way scarier in their first term. Johnny remembers cramming in their shared dorm and an incident in which their precious electric kettle died on them—it really _wasn’t_ Johnny’s attempt at cooking ramen in it that killed it, he _swears_ —in the middle of finals.

“ _Ouch_.” Johnny shakes out of his thoughts, holding his chest with a pained expression. He barely dodged the accusatory pen now that Jaehyun is quick to aim at him. “I just wanted to catch up with you, and you’re out here, being cold— _attacking_ me like you haven’t spent the past week ogling at Doyoung in your _study dates_ instead of actually _studying_.” This time Johnny doesn’t manage to dodge Jaehyun’s foot before it impacts with his shin and he groans in pain while Jaehyun looks triumphant, even despite his ears flushing as red as a stop light.

“Shut _up_ , Johnny,” Jaehyun tells him. Lately the phrase is really starting to feel like the motto of their friendship. “We are just _friends_.” He sounds more confused than he should but Johnny really doesn’t want to die tonight.

He’s on a mission.

So Johnny says “I believe you, I totally believe you!”, lets the subject drop—for the moment—and barely pauses to take a breath before adding, “But hey, now that we are speaking about your friend, our friends, all of that—” Johnny stumbles over his words but Jaehyun looks at him expectantly. “There’s this thing—tiny thing about Taeyong I’ve noticed, you see—”

Jaehyun groans and drops his head onto the table, making enough noise to make Johnny a little concerned—not exactly about Jaehyun but about them really getting kicked out. When Johnny looks around and realizes that there are only a couple students around, none of whom possess enough authority to kick them out, he lowers his head much more gently than Jaehyun to rest his cheek on the opposite half of Jaehyun’s notes to face the other man.

“You didn’t even let me _start_! I swear it’s not anything weird!” Johnny whisper-yells.

“ _Johnny_ ,” Jaehyun replies softly. Johnny tries his best to pay no mind to the note of pity he hears in Jaehyun’s voice.

“ _Jeffrey,_ ” Johnny shoots back. “He’s just been looking… odd, lately.”

“You mean like, ugly?” Jaehyun says. Johnny doesn’t resist the urge to smack his forehead.

“ _No_ ,” Johnny starts, exasperated. “Like, super tired and out of it?”

“How would _you_ know?” Jaehyun asks. Johnny grimaces at the unspoken _you guys don’t talk anymore_ tacked onto the end.

“I have two eyes and a brain, dude, unlike you— _stop it_ , you’ll end up in jail if you stab me with a pen and I’m _not_ the one that has a test tomorrow.” Johnny is quick to move his head off from the table and move as far away as he can from Jaehyun, who has somehow managed to acquire and weaponise a second pen.

“I’m not going to jail for stabbing you with a pen,” Jaehyun says, composing himself. Johnny wants to protest but he also wants to listen to what Jaehyun has to say. “Doyoung talked to me about it—shut _up_ , I _will_ murder you in your sleep,” he continues, the murder threat prompted by Johnny’s eyebrow waggle at the mention of Doyoungms name. “And something _is_ going on, but like, Doyoung says Taeyong hasn’t mentioned anything—and he really doesn’t want to push him.”

In the middle of the library, way too late, something small and rusty but probably fucking important moves in Johnny’s very core.

“ _Oh_ —that’s not—good,” Johnny manages to say, not even close to as eloquent as he had pictured himself being when he ran through this conversation on the walk from the dorm to the library.

Jaehyun makes a noise of agreement. “Not good at all.”

* * *

The truth is that it all started much further back than the fated late night library conversation. If Johnny were to be asked, he’d probably blame all of his mishaps on the past, but _this_ started back in the States, sitting on the floor with his mother at age eight and decorating his favorite family photo album with crooked stickers, excitedly pointing out what he remembers from every picture taken as they go through the pages.

Here’s the thing: Johnny remembers.

He has a good memory and he likes the past. The past is comfortable, the past is sleepovers and hushed conversations late at night, it’s his mother cooking his favorite food on his birthday. That’s not to say he _lives_ in it. He’s in the present but he loves all the memories that have shaped him—the good ones, naturally, but also, to a certain extent, the bad ones because he knows he wouldn't be _him_ without those.

Johnny remembers his mother’s embrace when he was a kid and how her shirt would soak up all of his tears when he thought there was _something_ in his room at night. He remembers the fireworks on the 4th of July and how his clothes stuck to his back as the night sky lit up and he stared in wonder.

He remembers moving to Korea to study, remembers the nervous feeling at the bottom of his stomach on the first day of orientation week and how he unknowingly sat next to the redhead who would become the reason Johnny became included in a tightly knit group of friends that never stopped shifting and forming; the reason he felt warm and taken care of for a long time.

That person—Taeyong—is the reason why the Johnny of two years later, currently sat in the middle of the cafeteria surrounded by that same group, is wondering _why_ the aforementioned man looks off and awkward in a way he usually never does; why he’s wearing the same clothes he’s worn the past two days and moving his food around his plate without really eating; why the bags under his eyes look especially dark.

Johnny remembers Taeyong.

He remembers spending the first orientation day sneaking glances to the side to catch glimpses of the man so painfully pretty it made Johnny’s stomach ache for entirely different reasons than it had ached for before. Remembers how red Taeyong’s ears got once he was caught glancing back. How shy his smile had been when they introduced themselves properly.

Johnny remembers how, after weeks, Taeyong would smile _at_ him when they were alone in the comfort of Johnny’s room in a way that rivaled the Sun. How perfectly he fit tucked under Johnny’s arm; how Johnny felt like he was floating when Taeyong kissed him the first time, both of them grinning with the moon as witness; and how they kissed so many times after that that he lost the count, but hadn’t lost the feeling. Never the feeling.

Johnny remembers Taeyong.

The Taeyong that he remembers is not the one sitting in front of him, pushing his food around the plate with his head down and his hair partially covered by the same red beanie he’s worn every day for the past week. The hair poking out of it looks greasy, like he hasn’t washed it properly in some time, and something heavy that feels exactly like worry grips at Johnny’s stomach and doesn’t let go.

* * *

Taeyong and Johnny were friends at first. They still are, if anyone asks Johnny. But once, they were something _else_. Not anything fully shaped or solid. Just _something_ that was _way_ past friendship and not quite yet commitment.

Johnny didn’t mind the lack of names, back then. What they had—long conversations late at night, stolen smiles during the day, drunken giggling every single time they locked themselves in the bathroom of Taeil’s and Hansol’s apartment to make out—whatever it was, it was fun, _Taeyong_ was fun and Johnny genuinely cherished every single moment they spent together; he tucked it gently and with care in the box labeled _Taeyong_ in his mind that was reserved for him and him only, the compartment that was a secret for Johnny to keep from the world.

When they talked for the first time—what feels like forever ago, but was actually just two years prior—Johnny never imagined how intertwined their lives would become. He also never imagined that the Taeyong he knew, bright and a little ridiculous, could manage to change over months into a shell of what he used to be. Johnny never imagined that it’d take him so long to catch on—never mind the fact that Taeyong’s issues aren’t supposed to be his business anymore.

So. They were— _are_ —friends, and they share basically the same friend group. It’s more than normal, albeit a little awkward at times, to be around each other. Honestly, the awkwardness is nothing compared to how bad it was when he first got back from Chicago. Taeyong wouldn’t even look at him in the eye after ignoring his texts for the better part of a month. Johnny had been too caught up with his family, old friends, and the complicated time zone difference—not to mention poor service during an impromptu road-trip—to notice.

But being around each other happens often (more than often) enough for Johnny to feel like they’ve got this we-once-were-kind-of-together-but-now-we-aren’t situation down to a T. He’s _so_ good at it that it doesn’t even phase him anymore, really.

It’s not like he spends more time than he should thinking about the dance major, missing how he seemed to fit perfectly with Johnny, or about how happy and giddy just talking to him felt. Johnny’s over this. He’s content with being friends, _really_. He’s told Jaehyun so many times, both drunk _and_ sober.

And so what if his sober confession included the tiniest bit of rambling about how he couldn’t understand the situation, how they had something so _good_ going on, how he had no idea where it all went wrong, and what he did to deserve that kind of radio silence? So what if he remembers the awful feeling that settled at the bottom of his stomach when everyone gathered for lunch on the first day back after the summer break and Taeyong wouldn’t even _look_ at him?

Johnny remembers.

Sometimes, he wishes he didn’t.

* * *

“We’ll talk, right?” Taeyong mumbles, his left hand pressed against Johnny’s cheek, face too close yet not close enough.

“Every single day,” Johnny replies, tightening his hold on Taeyong’s waist. It’s getting too hot to be close like this without air conditioning but Johnny doesn’t mind. He thinks Taeyong doesn’t mind, either. “I’ll miss you,” he adds after pressing a loud kiss on Taeyong’s forehead, smiling widely when Taeyong grumbles about him being gross and wipes his forehead.

“You’re _disgusting_ and I can’t believe I’m going to miss you too,” Taeyong says, playfully pinching Johnny’s cheek with two fingers. “Don’t go out too much, you might meet the love of your life in Chicago and what am I going to do then?”

“I only have eyes for you, _my darling_ ,” Johnny states with a cheesy smile on his face, exaggerating the last two words in a terrible British accent. Taeyong groans out loud, face pinched like he’s smelt Yuta’s soccer cleats, and buries his head in Johnny’s chest. He refuses to dignify Johnny’s cheesiness with an answer. Johnny can’t help but laugh out loud, delighted. _I love you_ , Johnny wants to say. “You’re stuck with me, now,” he says instead.

“I guess I am,” Taeyong says against Johnny’s chest. Johnny can barely hear him but his body vibrates with it. He thinks it feels enough like an _I love you, too_.

* * *

It takes approximately forty-eight hours after talking with Jaehyun for Johnny to make the executive decision to, in the name of friendship and the harmony of their well-balanced group dynamic, try to figure out what is going on with Taeyong—of course without, you know, actually talking to him about it.

(Because that would be—)

So Johnny starts doing his best to catch Taeyong’s eye and, in a way, test the waters, purely out of friendly concern—the same concern that drove him to ask Jaehyun (and Doyoung, and Taeil, and even _Yuta_ ) if he knew what was happening, obviously. He waves whenever he spots Taeyong walking around, and maybe even goes out of his way to walk with him to class after lunch—never mind that Johnny’s own class is on the other side of campus and he has to sprint to make it on time.

In the span of a week Johnny tries to take action and figure out what the actual _fuck_ is happening without much success at all. This is when he realizes how skittish Taeyong is—almost like a cat, eyes wide and posture defensive as though he’s been caught doing something bad. After a while he relaxes a little bit, actually replying to Johnny in a soft voice that, while not new, totally feels like it. Maybe Johnny grew used to Taeyong being the glue that keeps their ragtag group of mismatched friends together, always speaking in a way that may not be as loud as everyone else could be but commands attention anyway.

He realizes that being the focus of Taeyong’s time—for however brief—makes Johnny a little bit nervous and a whole lot stressed but also makes him feel like it’s spring and he’s blooming—until he remembers that this is not the time to _bloom_ or to use stupid metaphors, that something is _wrong_. Then he goes back to being concerned.

He just—didn’t realize how much he missed talking to Taeyong until they first walked to a lecture together and chatted about the most mundane shit the way they used to, with Johnny cracking a lame joke and Taeyong laughing in that silent way of his, only a little more subdued.

So. He learns some things, mostly related to how his feelings for Taeyong are like a rollercoaster and just how utterly beyond friendly they are. But he doesn’t have the answers he wants.

It’s _not_ really his place to be _this_ concerned anymore, he thinks with way less conviction than two weeks prior.

Johnny ignores Jaehyun’s stares and raised eyebrows when they are out. He also ignores his increasingly passive-aggressive texts demanding answers about _why_ Johnny’s suddenly talking to Taeyong again after months of radio silence from both sides and awkward not-conversations about how they are no longer together.

Johnny spends his nights half-heartedly doing homework, studying, and thinking about Taeyong and holding Taeyong and helping him deal with whatever it is he's dealing with—which is _something_ , he knows for sure now, after taking care to note how dark the circles under his eyes have become, how little he’s actually eating, how he hides his hair under that frankly disgusting red beanie—but also feeling like a coward and a lovesick fool who can’t move on from the boy that he met on the first day of university because his life is a fucking cliche.

And now it’s 2 am and he’s on his laptop scrolling through the website of the store that Taeyong’s older sister always sent him gifts from, and he’s impulsively purchasing the biggest Every Day Like Sunday candle he can find, and he’s remembering how Taeyong would light the one from his sister every single night until there was no more wax left to melt. He remembers the way Taeyong would contentedly blow out the wick after turning off the lights and tuck right into Johnny’s arms, pressing his always cold feet against Johnny’s legs, and laugh in delight at his complaints right before planting a quick kiss on Johnny’s lips and saying goodnight.

* * *

The plan was simple: go into Taeyong’s dorm building, leave the sparkly, green gift bag (full of goods that Johnny hoped Taeyong would enjoy: a brand new blue beanie; the candle he bought a week ago; an assorted selection of all the snacks he could remember Taeyong liked; and a sincere little note with some puns and an offer to talk that Taeyong probably wouldn’t consider) against the door, pray that no one would think of taking it, and then leave unnoticed and triumphant with the hope that eventually Taeyong would talk to someone, anyone—even if it wasn’t him.

It’s foolproof; he knows Doyoung is studying with Jaehyun in the library or, more likely, making eyes at him while clueless business major remains too caught up either in homework or his own crush on Doyoung to notice. It’s routine by now. Taeyong has class in the afternoons and while Johnny isn’t sure about the schedule (and he can’t _exactly_ ask Doyoung about it without being questioned about his _intentions_ , whatever that even _means_ ), he kind of has an estimate of when Taeyong is going to be in class.

It’s going to be perfect.

But of _course_ , nothing in the world goes the way Johnny needs. He is many things but _lucky_ isn’t one of them. In the middle of gingerly placing the bag on the floor outside Taeyong’s door, he hears footsteps approaching down the hall and realizes that Taeyong’s room is the last one on this floor, leaving has no way out but to _face_ whoever is behind him—

—And, of course, the person behind him is Taeyong himself, looking grumpy and exhausted. The dark circles under his eyes strike a stark contrast against his pale skin.

“Johnny, what the _fuck_ ,” Taeyong says. The keys on his right hand are starting to look a little bit like a possible murder weapon—he _really_ looks like he just had the worst day ever—and Johnny grimaces, cursing his bad timing. He moves back enough to let Taeyong open his door.

Johnny holds the green bag with both hands and thrusts his arms forward, offering it to Taeyong. He looks back at Johnny, hesitates for a few seconds, and then grabs the bag with the hand he’s not using to open his door.

“Can I—come inside?” Johnny inquires. He hates how high pitched his voice sounds but there’s no turning back now. He coughs, once, and speaks again in a lower tone. “ _Please_?”

Taeyong pushes the door open and walks into his room, leaving the door ajar for Johnny to follow him. He does so quickly, before Taeyong can change his mind.

Johnny carefully closes the door and enters the room, lingering not too far from Taeyong’s desk. He shifts from foot to foot, uncertain of what to do while he waits.

“What is all this?” Taeyong asks after he’s thrown his backpack on top of his bed. Johnny can hear the defensiveness in his voice. Taeyong’s brows are furrowed and he’s holding the bag in his hands like it’s a bomb about to explode, trying to figure out what it is without opening it by peering through the small opening Johnny left when he stapled the top shut.

“I, uh—” Johnny hesitates for a moment, cringing inwardly as he places his hands in the pockets of his jacket, before realizing that there’s no backing out of this situation and that _maybe_ he should’ve just _talked_ to Taeyong in the first place instead of this roundabout gesture that absolutely didn’t fucking work. He takes a deep breath in an attempt to soothe the thumping of his heart against his ribcage.

 _It’s now or never, Johnny,_ he thinks. He feels out of line and out of place. It’s a weird feeling, considering how well accustomed he used to be with this very same space. He tries to shake that off, to not let it affect his voice. “You looked… well, not so good lately? And I know that like, it’s not my place anymore—actually, I’m still your friend, right?” A pause, in which he notices Taeyong’s eyes avoiding him. “So it _is_ my place to be concerned and want to, uh—do something about it, and ask you how you’re doing—but I was so fucking _scared_ of approaching you because, _you know_ —so I thought getting you some, uh, things would help?”

Johnny takes another deep breath, thinking about how much easier it was to practice this hypothetical conversation late at night, and how he’s just fumbling his way through it now that he’s got Taeyong’s door behind him and _Taeyong_ in front of him, looking a little bit like he’s about to cry.

“ _Taeyong_ ,” Johnny calls, his voice soft. Taeyong looks up from his hands, right into Johnny’s eyes. Trying not to think too much about it, Johnny puts one of his hands on top of Taeyong’s right hand, the one that’s gripping the bag like his life depends on it, in hopes that the gesture comes across as comforting like he intends without making Taeyong feel awkward.

“I miss _home_ ,” Taeyong replies after what feels like forever. His voice is tiny, his eyes on Johnny’s hands where they rest over his. “I’m about to fail two classes, and Ruby is… really sick—and I miss her too,” Taeyong continues. Johnny freezes when he sees Taeyong blink away tears of what’s probably frustration. “It’s so _stupid_ , I _know_ , it’s not my first year staying here, and everyone is dealing with their own shit—”

“It’s _not_ stupid, just—everyone is worried, you know? you can talk to m- _us_ —well, you can talk to whoever you want to,” Johnny says. “I’m— _we_ are all here for you, Taeyong”

Taeyong sniffles and wipes at his eyes with the sleeve of his oversized hoodie. “It feels silly when I say it out loud,” he says. Johnny wants to contradict him again but Taeyong’s attention is already back on the bag.

“What did you even put in here?” Taeyong asks, curious. It sounds a little like he’s deflecting but Johnny really doesn’t want to push the other man.

“Oh, you know, stuff.” Johnny makes a dismissive gesture with the hand that was once on top of Taeyong’s, a little embarrassed. “Some snacks, a candle—” and that’s all he has to say before Taeyong is digging in the bag looking for it.

“Every Day Like Sunday,” Taeyong reads out loud, holding the candle in his hands carefully. He all but presses it to his face to inhale the scent. “You… remembered,” Taeyong continues, eyes shining with something Johnny can’t quite place—it’s odd, being both so familiar and unfamiliar with someone—but so raw that it all but splits him from head to toe.

“I did,” Johnny replies. Words that are better suited to how he feels about Taeyong like _I miss you_ and _I remember all of you_ and _how could I ever forget?_ sit on the tip of his tongue. Taeyong’s eyes bore into his in a way that makes Johnny want to close his eyes, to move back, to run. “I have a good memory,” he says instead.

He doesn’t drop Taeyong’s gaze.

* * *

" _Johnny_ , it's late," Taeyong giggles. He’s three sheets to the wind, his fingers firmly holding onto the lapels of Johnny's coat. It's late at night and they’re supposed to be on their way back to Taeyong's dorm from Ten's birthday get-together—in Taeil’s apartment, of course, and supplied with enough alcohol to get even Johnny tipsy—but they’ve somehow ended up tucked into the barely lit corner of an alley, not too far away from where they left their friends.

"I just want to kiss you," Johnny replies. His body is pressed close to Taeyong’s and he’s thoroughly enjoying how easy it is to hold the other man close.

"You can do that once we get home," Taeyong says. Johnny briefly curses his bright idea of walking the distance from the apartment to the dorm rooms. He’s drunk enough to ignore the fact that Taeyong shares a room with Doyoung—who hopefully decides to steer clear for the night—and let the warm and fuzzy feeling in his chest grow freely.

He really likes the idea of home, and Taeyong. And home with Taeyong. He thinks that maybe, anywhere with Taeyong could be home.

Even the place they are standing in right now, despite the foul smell surrounding them and—what the _fuck_ is moving in the corner of his eye?

"I don't wanna wait," Johnny replies, petulant. He forces himself to stop that train of thought and ignore whatever just moved, choosing to blame it on the alcohol thrumming through his veins.

Taeyong laughs, a warm little thing. The neon of a sign above them casts a pink hue over his skin. He looks like he's out of this world and Johnny thinks, briefly, that there's a little bit of truth in that.

"There's no rush," Taeyong tells him. One of his hands abandons its grip on Johnny's coat to settle on the back of his neck instead, a welcome grounding weight. He sounds so sure of his words, so confident that all Johnny can do is believe him with his whole heart.

"Even if we don't do it now—we'll have all the time in the world. You'll see," he continues, index finger reaching out to tap Johnny's nose once, twice, and Johnny doesn't know if he should laugh at the ridiculousness of the timing and how deep these words nest in his heart or cry at what feels like a drunk love declaration in the middle of a dirty alley that smells like piss and something else that he can't properly identify.

There are a million words running through Johnny's mind, and yet the sight of Taeyong smiling at him openly, lips shiny and tempting, makes Johnny settle for pressing their lips together again, every nerve of his body alight.

* * *

Here’s the thing: Johnny remembers.

He has a good memory and he likes the past. The past is comfortable, the past is sleepovers and hushed conversations late at night, it’s his mother cooking his favorite food on his birthday, it’s waking up early on Sundays to watch his favorite cartoons. The past is meeting Taeyong, the past is not understanding why he wouldn’t meet his eyes when he got home from Chicago after the summer. The past is wondering where he went wrong. The past is being too scared to do something about it. The past is waiting for Taeyong at the bus station to come from his spontaneous trip back home.

This is all about re-learning each other. It’s getting coffee together after class, it’s texting until they both fall asleep just like they used to. It’s about figuring out what they missed along the way and picking up on new things.

This is all about the present.

 _He was right_ , Johnny thinks, fingers lazily combing through Taeyong's hair. It’s late at night and for once they are alone in Johnny’s dorm, curled up in bed. Taeyong watches a movie but Johnny only understands about half of it, too busy subtly staring at the way the light coming from the laptop screen catches on Taeyong’s face; too busy allowing himself to bask in that feeling of warmth and _home_.

Taeyong laughs at whatever just happened on the screen and turns to look at Johnny, eyes sparkling with mirth, and the uncertainty Johnny once felt seems foolish now.

 _There's no rush_.

**Author's Note:**

> find me @ [twitter](https://twitter.com/florulentae)


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